


Feels Like Looking Backward

by Duck_Life



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Archaeology, Episode: s06e07 Rascals, Gen, Starfleet Academy, Teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-23
Packaged: 2020-12-28 21:31:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21143528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duck_Life/pseuds/Duck_Life
Summary: "TROI: You could return to the Academy. Take another degree. Brush up on your Latin.PICARD: And be Wesley Crusher's roommate?"Yes. That's exactly what he does.





	Feels Like Looking Backward

**Author's Note:**

> NOTE: While working on this fic, I kept coming back to Keiko O’Brien. In an alternate universe where the events of “Rascals” are not reversed, the question of Keiko weighed heavily on me. Jean-Luc being stuck as a teenager lends itself to hilarious hijinks, but Keiko being trapped as a kid, considering she has a husband and a daughter, was nightmarish. 
> 
> I finally figured out a solution— Unlike Ro and Picard, Guinan and Keiko both have children. Perhaps Dr. Crusher determined a way to return Guinan and Keiko to their correct ages using DNA from their offspring. As they have no children, Picard and Ro were left stuck in their de-aged forms while Guinan and Keiko were able to return to their normal lives.

Wesley startles awake in the middle of the night at the sound of his dorm door opening and all the folders on his desk being knocked over. Then hushed giggling, more things falling on the floor. He groans and rolls over. “Could you guys keep it down?” he grumbles, pressing his pillow over his head.

“Oops, busted,” Ro Laren snickers, weaving her way through the cramped dormitory. “Jean-Luc, you’re in trouble now.”

“Wesley doesn’t mind,” Jean-Luc assures her, plopping down on the foot of Wesley’s bed. “Right, Wesley?” 

Wesley mumbles something into his pillow that sounds vaguely like, “I hate you.” 

“Alright, well, I did my job,” Ro declares, edging back toward the door. “I have safely delivered you back to your room, Jean-Luc. And with that, I bid you adieu.” They both reek of alcohol. Wesley might legitimately kill Picard. He has an exam first-thing tomorrow morning. 

“Adieu, adieu,” Jean-Luc says, swinging his feet off the bed. 

Ro Laren leaves, shutting the door behind her, and Wesley uses his foot to shove Jean-Luc off of his bed. “You’ve got your own bed,” he points out. 

“So I do,” Jean-Luc says. He teeters across the floor and sinks onto his own bed, drawing the covers up to his chest. “Goodnight, Wesley.” 

Wesley is, mercifully, already asleep again. 

  
  
  
  


“I thought you said this was only temporary,” Wesley sighs. He hopes his mom can see the dark circles under his eyes through the vidchat.

“Well, you know, all things are temporary,” Dr. Crusher points out, offering him a weak smile. “Eventually, he’ll be, um, older again.”

“What, in 30 years?” Wesley scoffs. “No offense, Mom, but if you and the science teams haven’t come up with a fix yet, it doesn’t seem like it’s ever going to happen.” 

  
  
  


When Wesley returns to his room, Jean-Luc is standing in the middle of the floor with guilt written all over his face. “Oh, hello, Wesley,” he says, feigning innocence. “Did you have a good meal?”

Wesley only needs to look at his expression for about two seconds to form a hypothesis. “Uh-huh,” he says, and he starts knocking on the panels in the walls. “Vash? Vash, you can come out!”

“Vash?” Jean-Luc says, laughing too loudly. “Why would Vash be here?” 

“Is that how you want to play it?” Wesley asks. He grabs a shovel leaning against the wall— which is suspicious enough on its own— and sticks it under Jean-Luc’s bed. 

“Hey!” the cry comes from beneath the bed. 

“Oh, will you look at that?” Jean-Luc says as Vash scrambles out from under the bed. “Vash! What are you doing under there! Ha! No doubt some trickery—”

“Yeah, he’s not buying it, Jean-Luc,” she says, folding her arms. “Fine, Crusher, you win. We were going on a dig.” 

“Ah,” Wesley says, folding his arms right back. “And would this dig be… sanctioned by the academy? Or the Daystrom Institute, maybe?” They both shake their heads slowly. “Cool. Cool. Love it. You’re going to make me go prematurely bald, Jean-Luc.”

“I miss being bald,” Jean-Luc sighs. 

  
  
  


Unfortunately for Wesley— and Earth— when Vash comes to visit, she never comes alone. 

“Q, Q, buddy, you gotta help me,” Wesley pleads. “Remember that time you had Riker make me all old and stuff? Do it to Picard! Make him old again! I’m begging you.” 

"No can do," Q sighs. "It would violate my prime directive."

"Since when do you give a damn about the Prime Directive?"

"Ah, ah," Q tuts, waving a finger at him. "Not  _ the  _ Prime Directive. My prime directive: making the world around me as entertaining as possible. And mon capitaine stuck being as a teenager is  _ endlessly _ entertaining."

  
  


“I don’t get it,” Wesley sighs, dropping his tablet on the table between him and Jean-Luc. “You were the one who said you wanted to come back to the academy and study all the things you didn't have time for your first time around. Why do you keep ditching class? And— and— going off on crazy adventures with Ro and Vash?”

Jean-Luc sets his own tablet down and rubs his eyes. “Wesley… you didn’t know me when I was young,” he says. “I mean the first time around. I was impulsive, reckless… to be honest, something of a rascal. I thought it would be different the second time around, but…” He shrugs. “It seems I’ve just fallen back into my old habits.” 

  
  


Wesley wakes Jean-Luc up one morning by dumping a pile of cards and art projects on him. “We got mail from the Enterprise,” he announces, grinning at his roommate. “Check it out.” 

Jean-Luc surveys the assortment of handmade items. “Oh, good lord.” 

“Happy Captain Picard Day,” Wes snickers, picking out a clay model of Jean-Luc. “Look at this. I think he’s my favorite.” 

“Why the hell are they still doing Captain Picard Day?” Jean-Luc grumbles, sitting up. “Will’s the captain, they should be making papier-mache models of  _ him _ .” 

“I think they did that, too,” Wes says. “But the kids are so attached to Captain Picard Day.”

Jean-Luc looks at the art projects in his lap— drawings, paintings, sculptures. “They’re all…” he starts, and trails off. 

Wes gets it. “They’re all modeled after how you looked… before,” he says. Then, he grabs one of the drawings. “Not this one. It’s Alexander Rozhenko’s, look.” Alexander drew Jean-Luc as he is now— fresh-faced and young, with a full head of hair. “What do you think?” Wes asks.

Jean-Luc says, “I kind of like it.” 

  
  
  


“About a month after the… incident,” Picard says, looking down at his hands. “I requested an additional examination. By your mother.”

“Hey, now—”

“No, I’m sorry,” Picard says, chuckling. “I didn’t mean that in a rude way. I really did ask your… Dr. Crusher to perform a neural scan. I was concerned that the deaging process may have had an even more serious impact on me than previously imagined.” He sighs. “I was experiencing… moments of impulsivity, recklessness. I thought perhaps there was something wrong with my brain.”

“And was there?” Wesley asks.

“Not a thing,” Picard says quietly. “She theorized that everything I was encountering was all… social. Psychological.” 

  
  
  
  
  


There’s a chime from Wesley’s tablet. “The results,” he says, scrambling to open the program. Jean-Luc watches as his eyes search the screen. Then, Wesley’s face breaks into a wide grin. “ _ Yes _ . I got an almost-perfect score on my quantum physics exam.”

“Well done,” Jean-Luc says, clapping him on the shoulder. “I’m so proud of you, Jack.” Wesley looks up from the tablet in a sharp movement, staring at him. “What?”

“You called me Jack,” Wes points out.

Jean-Luc looks embarrassed. “Did I? … I’m sorry. I meant, ah, good job, Wesley.”

“Do I really remind you of my dad?” 

“Sometimes,” Jean-Luc admits. “... I miss him.”

“I’m sorry,” Wes says.

Jean-Luc looks surprised. “You don’t have to… I mean, he was your father.”

“Yeah, but when I miss him, I miss him as a dad,” Wesley says. “You miss him as, like, a person. I don’t know, it’s different. He was your best friend. I… I can’t even imagine losing my best friend.”

Jean-Luc gives him a strange look. “Who is your best friend?” 

“Huh?”

“I mean, I know you have friends you study with,” Jean-Luc says. “I just… well, I was just curious. I didn’t know whether you had a best friend or not.” 

“Well, I…” Wesley thinks about it for a moment. Then, with a groan, he presses his forehead against his desk. 

“What, what is it?” Jean-Luc asks.

“Ugh,” Wes says. “I hate to say it, but… I think it’s you. I think you’re my best friend.” 

Jean-Luc has a shelf in the dorm that gradually fills up with archeological finds— statues and trinkets, medallions, spearheads, crystals, pieces of jewelry. He has one Tartaran fertility urn that Vash has tried to make off with more than a few times. Supposedly, it can fetch a high profit; Jean-Luc just likes it for the novelty. 

Wesley often finds himself admiring some of the pieces, particularly the glint of the Saurian chalice on the far left. “What are you going to do with all this stuff when it’s over?” Wes asks Jean-Luc. 

“When what’s over?” Jean-Luc asks, dusting off an Andorian statue. 

“Well… look, we all know this won’t last forever,” Wes points out. “My mom’s going to figure something out, or Data will, or somebody else. You’ll be back to your old… old… self.”

“Mm,” Jean-Luc considers. “Are you asking if I’m worried about growing up?”

“Well… yeah, I guess.”

“Are you?” Jean-Luc asks. 

Wes grins. “Of course I am.” 

Jean-Luc huffs. “I suppose someday I’ll look back on all this as just… one more bizarre chapter of my life.”

“Yeah,” Wes says, watching him return the statue to the shelf, “I think that’s how every teenager feels.” 

  
  
  
  



End file.
